


Smooth Criminals

by KoreArabin



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (2010)
Genre: Beer, Coats, Cognac, Lust, M/M, Mist, Pre-decimal currency, Unrequited Love, Victorian
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-08-18
Updated: 2013-05-10
Packaged: 2017-11-12 09:36:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,669
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/489419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KoreArabin/pseuds/KoreArabin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After meeting a stranger with a mysterious proposition, Colonel Sebastian Moran is introduced to Professor James Moriarty.</p><p>The first chapter of an ongoing WIP, which will focus on the relationship between the two men.  Set in the Victorian London of the RDJ films.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Strange Meeting, or how the the second most dangerous man in London met the most dangerous man in London.

He turns the collar of his woollen greatcoat up against the chill of the late autumn evening, the light already gone from the sky and a dun-coloured veil hanging over the rooftops. The air down by the river is thick and murky with mist and coal smoke, and his breath makes blotchy white clouds in the dankness. He stops in the warm glow of a gas lamp to light a cigarette. 

Slipping the matches back into his pocket, he sighs at the jingle of the few coins remaining. Other than a last couple of guineas in his money belt, three crowns and a handful of shillings and pence are all he has to his name in the world. The time is fast drawing near when he'll no longer be able to afford even the single room in the mean lodging house, and the thought of the doss house or - God forbid! - the street, with winter fast approaching, is too monstrous to contemplate. Still, he has enough for a drink. A drink'll take all of those worldly cares away for another few hours and, by God, he needs a few hours of indifferent insensibility on a dismal evening like this.

He pushes into the drinking house, ducking slightly to avoid braining himself on the low, crooked, doorframe, and is soon ensconced at a table in a dark corner as near to the hearth as he can get. There are a few other patrons in tonight, solitary, shady figures, nursing their beers in silence, no doubt like him simply glad to be inside in the company of other human beings.

So he takes little notice when another customer beckons the publican over to pour him a beer, until he hears the man's voice. It stands out in the rough drinking house, cultured and well-bred; quite different to the gruff, low voices usually rumbling away quietly. The man is tall, well-dressed but not ostentatiously so, his thick Ulster complimented by a warm fur collar, but otherwise unremarkable. What is, however, remarkable is that the man turns from the bar to walk straight over to the corner where he's sitting.

"May I join you?" the man asks, sitting down at the table without waiting for a response.

"Suit yourself."

"Colonel Sebastian Moran, yes? I would say that I am pleased to make your acquaintance, but I am not here on my own account. A certain party, an _interested_ party, shall we say, has asked me to put forward a proposition to you. One, he feels, that should interest you."

Moran stares at the stranger. "And you are?"

"My name is of no consequence in the conduct of this business, as is the identity of the interested party at this juncture. I am simply here as his agent. All he asks is that you accompany me to meet him, whereupon he will explain his proposal to you. You are then free to accept or decline, as you wish."

"Well, _stranger_ , I am not in the habit of accompanying total strangers to meet with other total strangers, no matter how "interested" they may be. So I'll have to not-so-politely decline, and tell you to cock off and leave me to my beer, mate."

The man smiles, apparently genuinely amused. "Oh, come now, Colonel. You're a disgraced former army officer with no prospects. Your slide down the social scale has taken you from comfortable lodgings in Mayfair to a single room in a Soho stew. With the few remaining, fast dwindling, resources you have about your person, it is but a small step now to the gutter or the workhouse. You're an intelligent man; you'll have worked this out for yourself. I'd hazard a wager it is the very fact you _have_ worked this out for yourself that has brought you here, to use your last few coppers to drown your sorrows in alcohol."

He continues, more gently. "Really. What do you have to lose, Colonel, by taking a walk with me?"

-O-

The man leads them out of the warren of narrow alleyways near the river until they reach the main thoroughfare, whereupon he hails a cab. Moran has followed him silently, a knot of anger at his humiliation burning in his stomach. All too recently he would have told such a presumptuous fellow to go to hell, following it up with a few hards blows if the bastard persisted. Yet now he's had his whole sorry fall from grace shoved in his face - his face bloody _rubbed_ in it, to be _absolutely accurate_ \- and all he can do is tuck his tail between his legs in meek acquiescence, and follow the stranger like a bloody puppy dog.

When the stranger turns to him in the cab, insisting that he dons the proffered blindfold, it is all he can do not to punch the man. 

In all his years of hard-drinking, of war and fighting, of bloody violence, he has never before felt such a maelstrom of impotent fury at the world coursing through his veins. He wants to lash out, to hit and bite and render apart, to commit bloody mayhem against the rest of humanity for bringing him so low. He wants again to savour the scent of _blood_ on the air.

-O-

The hansom at last draws to a halt, and the blindfold is removed. Before them is a large townhouse, set back from the road behind a high wall topped with railings. After tipping the cabbie, the stranger leads Moran through the stout front gate and around to a stairway leading to a door in the basement wall of the house.

"Tradesman's entrance already, is it?" Moran smiles wryly. "Yes, it seems - fitting."

He is surprised when the door is unlocked, expecting a scullery or laundryroom, but instead there is a short hallway leading to a rotunda, with several doors set into the walls. A central spiral staircase leads up, presumably, to the ground and other floors of the house.

"What is this place?" he asks the stranger, but he merely shrugs.

"Storerooms, laboratories, rooms of that kidney. Come along, we need to ascend to the study."

Moran cannot understand why they have entered the house through a basement sidedoor, only then to climb the stairs to the floors they would presumably have entered from the front door. Once they reach the ground floor, however, it becomes clear. It is almost as if the house is cut in half crossways, there being (as far as Moran can ascertain, and he is sure that they have not moved towards the front of the building from where they entered it, only straight on across it) a dividing wall which separates the front part from the back section of the property. It is the most curious building he has ever found himself in, but he has little opportunity to ponder before they are standing before a polished oak door.

The stranger knocks, and presently there is a soft, "Enter."

The room is large, opulently decorated and furnished, a large mahogany writing desk before the drawn curtains, and lined from floor to ceiling with heaving bookcases. Piles of papers sit on tables, and Moran spies a large blackboard in one corner, half covered with a cloth. The part of the board he can see appears to be covered with indecipherable swiggles. 

His attention is drawn to a figure sitting in one of the deep leather armchairs before the fire, a brandy glass in his hand, the amber liquid swirling lazily. "Colonel Moran is here, Professor."

The man in the armchair does not look up from his glass, but merely says, in a soft voice, "Thank you. You may leave us. Colonel Moran, won't you join me here by the fire and partake of this very fine cognac?"


	2. Introductions and emoluments

Moran steps over to the armchair and scrutinises the man occupying it. Aged somewhere around his fiftieth year. Pale auburn hair, combed back from his face, and an auburn beard and moustache, greying slightly on the chin and jowls. A muddy, rather coarse complexion, lined and slightly freckled. Moran stifles an internal snort; he, too, is blessed with reddish hair, although of a far darker hue than the Professor's, and freckles, and he's been teased about them since he was a boy.

But Moran considers that by far the Professor's most memorable features must be his mouth and eyes. The mouth is small, tight, petulant even, but the lower lip is pink, and pouting. The eyes are clear blue, direct, indicative of a fierce intellect, and yet. Moran cannot quite put a finger on exactly what it is that disturbs him about those eyes, but he senses ennui; a lack of empathy or, indeed, any real affinity with his fellow men. All in all something of a moral vacuity. A trait that Moran recognised in himself, too many years ago, now, than he cares to remember.

Therefore, Moran feels, in his spleen, in his very moral fibre, that this is a man with whom he shares an innate kinship, a meeting of minds and appetites; in all, damn it! A man in collaboration with whom he might begin to feel alive again.

The man, the Professor, gestures to the matching armchair. "Please, sit down, Colonel. Cognac?"

"Yes, uh, please. Thank you."

He watches the Professor, wanting to ask why he has been brought here and what the Professor wishes to discuss with him, but unable to articulate the question clearly enough without sounding defensive. And even if he were simply concerned about jeopardising any possible working relationship by starting off on the wrong foot with his prospective employer, Colonel Sebastian Moran never negotiates from a position of defensiveness. Thankfully, just as Moran is about to blurt out something brusque and unpolished and aggressive, the Professor begins to speak.

"Colonel Sebastian Moran. Born, London. Son of Sir Augustus Moran, CB, sometime Minister to Persia. Educated at Eton and Oxford. Formerly of the 1st Bangalore Pioneers, serving in the Jowaki Expedition and the Afghan War, mentioned in dispatches at the Battle of Charasiab; fought at Sherpur and at Kabul.

A writer, I understand. The author of two books?

Once crawled down a drain after a wounded man-eating tiger, armed only with a knife, and killed it. An exceptionally skilled shot.

Did I omit any salient detail in my precis, Colonel?"

Moran is momentarily taken aback, not anticipating such an effective summation of his life to date from the man sitting across from him, but then laughs, mirthlessly. "Only the dishonourable discharge, Professor. Seeing as hows you've got everything else down pat, and that fellow there at the pub knowed all about it, there don't seem no point in not being up front with you."

The Professor studies him, fingers steepled below his chin, and lips pursed. "Indeed, Colonel. But it is in fact that very episode in your history that alerted me to your expertise, and your rather dismal progress or, rather, lack of it since returning home."

Moran bridles at that, but holds his tongue.

"Let me speak plainly, Colonel. I have interests that sometimes require the kind of skills which a man such as yourself possesses. My business is somewhat unique. I supervise the operation of, inter alia, banking arrangements of an ususual kind, as well as dabbling in some of the more - esoteric - investment strategies."

"As I said, my interests are, let us say, out of the ordinary. My methods, therefore, must at times be similarly unorthodox. And this is where you enter the equation, my good Colonel."

Moran knows little of the world of finance, other than drawing a soldier's pay and, more recently, having increasingly frequent run ins with the bailiff. The days of drawing on his father's allowance are a very dim, repressed memory. The fact that he ever accepted any kind of succour from that man rankles too deeply, even now. Push it down, Sebastian, push it all down.

"I don't quite follow, Professor. Mathematics and that ain't my forte."

"My dear Colonel Moran, I do not require a dry accountant or a snivelling office clerk. What I want is a man who can ensure that my interests are protected, that my investment decisions are put into practice. In short, Colonel, I require a man with a steady hand - a good shot, but, no - an excellent shot - and the ability to carry out my directions without demur. I believe that you are such a man, with a little instruction."

"In return for your service, you shall have a salary commensurate with your abilities, accommodation here with me, or in lodgings when I have to travel on business. Clothing, food, guns to your specifications, anything you need to fulfil your duties."

Moran stares at the Professor, trying to gauge what the catch must be. The offer is too good to be true - his being supplied with every comfort and, if he understands the Professor correctly, eliminating any threats to his business via the scope of a rifle.

"Nah, Professor. It is too bloody good to be true. C'mon, where's the catch?"

"Sebastian. There is no "catch". Well, perhaps one. If you enter my employ, you do not leave it unless I say that you will leave it. That is the only catch. And very, very few of my employees have ever voiced a wish to leave me. As I said, my employ attracts only the very best emoluments, and being handsomely rewarded for simply doing what one enjoys doing surely smacks of making hay whilst the sun shines?"

Moran takes a deep breath. As the man in the pub said, what does he have to lose?

"Very well, Professor. It seems we have an agreement."


	3. Excision

The Professor rises, and Moran feels that he should, too. "No time like the present, Colonel. To test your mettle, I mean. I should like to have a preliminary demonstration of your capabilities."

Moran stares at the Professor. "And here I thought my engagement here was on the basis of my antecedents, Sir? Now you're wantin' to test me out, as it were?"

Moriarty smiles, an expression of genuine amusement. "My dear Colonel, I have no doubt at all of your capabilities. I simply have a most vexing irritation, a _thorn_ in my side, which needs to be excised, and I have no doubt whatsoever that you shall do so admirably. And, I'll wager, enjoy yourself in the process."

Moran lets himself be led through the strange house, the Professor explaining its structure as they walk. "I like to keep my public persona totally separate from my private concerns, and this building, which I have adapted over the years to my detailed specification, affords me the ability to do precisely that. The front part of the building houses my drawing rooms, my social dining room and my study, as well as the kitchens and other servants' preparatory rooms below stairs. The back of the building contains another, more private, study, bedrooms, a laboratory, and various subterranean rooms with which I imagine you shall become quite intimately acquainted, Colonel.

And it is to one of these rooms that we shall now descend." They are now on the small landing above the spiral staircase, which appears to end abruptly in a featureless wall; a wall one would most probably assume was the rear boundary of the property if one did not know to the contrary. The Professor motions with his hand, pushing at something in the wall and, with a slight creak, a doorway opens before them.

"Good God, Sir, how the deuce did you do that?" Moran stands quite dumbstruck, as the the Professor had summoned up a medium's apparition, complete with flowing skeins of ectoplasm. Moriarty grins. "Surely you are not a man of superstition, Colonel? A cleverly disguised release mechanism is all, designed to be barely visible to the naked eye."

"Well, yes, well. You got me there, Sir, so you bloody did."

The doorway opens on to a virtual mirror image of the front part of the house, with doors set into a corridor which leads away into the distance in front of them, and another staircase leading down into the depths of the building. The Professor leads them down the staircase, and then through another door and down another flight of steep, rather precipitous, steps. At the bottom of the flight of steps is a small area bounded on two sides by stout wooden doors. The Professor produces a key and unlocks one of the doors.

The room beyond is dark and chill, and Moran shivers as the Professor lights the lamp on the wall beside the door. There, before them, is a huddled shape, apparently bound to a chair, its head hanging forwards over its chest, its clothes torn and in disarray. 

"Behold the price of treachery, Colonel. This _snake_ thought to inveigle himself into my organisation, only to pass on information to the police. Although God alone knows why anyone who is not himself a policeman should wish to do such a thing. Christ knows I pay far better than those bumbling fools, not to mention that if you attempt to thwart me, you stand in the way not merely of an individual, but of a mighty organisation, the full extent of which this fool has been unable to realise. And so he shall now learn what it is to be removed entirely from the game, to be trodden underfoot without a moment's hesitation."

The figure in the chair stirs, and Moran can see that he has been badly beaten. His collar and tie have been torn away, his shirt ripped open, and his face is a mass of purpling bruises and vivid gashes.

"What do you want me to do, Sir?"

"He has still not given up the names of his handlers in the police force. I want them. I want to be able to send them a clear message that one does not meddle in my affairs without there being - consequences. Obtain the names for me, Colonel, then excise this irritation, and dispose of it."


	4. Awakening

This afternoon, Sebastian sits in silent reverie and contemplation. The Professor is out, on one of his very rare appointments without his chief of staff beside him. Sebastian was in turn surprised, then aggrieved, then resigned to his employer's unusual course of action. He assumes that it will involve Holmes. The insufferable, meddling Sherlock Holmes, who always somehow manages to distract the Professor from what Sebastian considers are his best interests.

At least the Professor will now occasionally consult with him before making decisions. Sebastian knows that the Professor values his judgement and his experience, even if he ultimately rejects his counsel. And Sebastian will accept the Professor's decisions, _now_ ; he will no longer argue with him, angrily, incensed at what he regards as the relative amateur's casual disregard of the wisdom and experience of the professional, as he did at the beginning of their relationship.

Indeed, how _very_ different it was at the beginning of their association, when Sebastian was a wild, untamed soul, freshly discharged - dishonourably - from Her Majesty's Army, at war with the world and British society in particular. The Professor offered him engaging, exciting, _dangerous_ employment; his first kill for the Professor set his depressed, jaded nerves singing - he was alive again, and doing what he excelled at - and - for a man by whom he was in equal parts fascinated, and in awe of.

The Professor is like no-one Sebastian has ever previously encountered, a heady union of an amazingly vast, frighteningly quick intellect, combined with a total amorality which excites Sebastian and makes him want to stroke the hot, dripping, hardness that springs up between his legs when he is alone in his bedroom at night. 

But his developing relationship with his employer leaves him puzzled. The Professor clearly values his new employee's skill, whether that be in removing an obstacle to one of his various stratagems ("snuffin' out a vexation", in Sebastian parlance), apparently effortlessly managing the rest of his employees, or arranging the Professor's affairs so very capably. 

However, even when Sebastian is not engaged on some aspect of work for him, the Professor appears to enjoy his company, judging from how often he will ask Sebastian to eat with him, or accompany him on his excursions to the various parks near his London townhouse, usually to feed his beloved pigeons (or flying _rats_ , as Sebastian privately thinks of them). 

Yet. There is always something more, rippling almost imperceptively beneath the surface of their day to day interactions. Sebastian cannot exactly put a finger on what it is precisely that makes him so immensely sensitive to his employer's presence, but the slightest gesture or glance makes him - what? Long to submit to another person, to let that person completely dominate him, whether that be as part of their roles as employer and employee, or in a less formal, more _sexual_ situation.

Sebastian has always enjoyed sex, in whatever form it may take, from his inexperienced fumbles with the maids at home when he was growing up, to the painted sluts of any military town, to the groaning, biting, vicious exchanges with fellow soldiers, away on the hot, never-ending campaigns abroad. And if he is pressed for a declaration as to his preference - for dainty, soft, perfumed _cunt_ , or aggressive, physical, masculine, cock and _arse_ \- he will unashamedly opt for the latter.

And, he has always taken a dominant role, in _any_ sexual encounter, in the past. He relishes getting his way in bed, indulging in the carnal acts he enjoys, leading his partner, bending him or her to his will, making them submit, making them complicit, through his charm and his sheer masculine sensuality. He has never considered what it would be to be used by a partner for that person's pleasure. 

Yet, _now_ he cannot prevent himself speculating how it would feel to have the Professor pressing him down into the bedsheets, cock buried deep inside him, perhaps twisting his arms up behind him as he fucks him into submission. Sebastian is in equal parts excited and appalled by these thoughts of sex, pain and submission, and the Professor never gives any indication that such feelings are reciprocated; in fact, to the best of Sebastian's knowledge, his employer leads a rather sober, solitary, _celibate_ life.

Sebastian therefore contents himself with his hand or, when prowling the London streets after dark, or drinking in one of the low taverns down by the riverside, paying a whore for a twopenny upright in a murky alleyway or a swift and slightly more comfortable encounter in the straw of a stable yard. Although the rather generous stipend he received from the Professor enables him to frequent the more salubrious establishments in Chelsea or Kensington for such purposes, Sebastian has always preferred the anonimity of the dark backstreets.

And if, increasingly frequently, he closes his eyes during these brief acts of coitus, and imagines his partner to be a tall, distinguished, hirsute gentleman with a low, gravel-tinged voice and ice blue cold-as-the-March-wind eyes, and if that thought sends a current of excitement down his spine to his groin, and he cries out at the intensity of the climax it produces, then it is of course only a thought, a _fantasy_ , and a scenario which Sebastian knows will not occur in actuality.


	5. Man of Granite

"Colonel, I should like you to accompany me downstairs. I have something to show you."

Sebastian stands, stiffening his resolve. Will it be another traitor to punish, or an interrogation today? Down in the grimy cellar room they use for such activities. He should change into an older shirt; blood is so difficult to get out of the fine linen and he doesn't want yet another good garment ruined.

"I'll just be a minute, Sir. I'll change into older clothes."

"Ah, no. That will not be necessary, Colonel. I do not require _those_ services of you today. No, I have something I wish to show to you. Although our acquaintance is not so very long, I have been pleased, _extremely_ pleased, with your diligence and your discretion in dealing with my affairs and, perhaps, even more so with the _loyalty_ , to me personally, that you have demonstrated. 

I confess that I consider that such assiduousness would appear to be far above and beyond the service given by even the most conscientious employee, and would perhaps indicate a willingness to please, on the part of the servant,  
suggesting that there is a more _personal_ devotion to his Master at play? I have, consequently, decided to take you into my confidence rather more than I would normally consider appropriate with one of my employees."

Sebastian feels himself flushing. Damn the Professor; can he see so easily into his private thoughts and desires? Even with his years of subterfuge and hiding in plain sight - undetected - is he so very transparent? 

"Thank you, Sir. I am very, um, very honoured that you should think so."

"Good, Colonel, then let us descend."

oOo 

Sebastian gasps as the Professor unlocks the stout old wooden door, set with thick bands of iron, and swings it open. Beyond is what appears at first glance to be simply a bedroom-cum-study, the walls hung with deep red velvet and thick Persian rugs on the floor. At one side is a large four poster bed, covered with a dark crimson damask counterpane which matches the wall hangings. A deep, comfortable-looking sofa faces the fireplace, in which a fire is roaring, and there are shelves and cupboards, one of which is clearly a drinks cabinet, on either side of the chimney breast.

However, the item of furniture which particularly catches Sebastian's attention is what he at first takes to be a large table, in the middle of the room, behind the sofa, but on closer inspection it is more akin to a surgeon's operating table than a household table. Particularly intriguing are the metal rings and hooks set at regular intervals around the sides of the table, a couple of which appear to have chains attached to them.

Immediately several reasons for the presence of the rings and chains spring into Sebastian's mind, none of them exactly favourable, but all of which make his cock twitch in his small clothes. "Sir? What is the purpose of this? I don't quite understand..."

The Professor does not answer immediately, busying himself with retrieving a decanter of cognac from the cabinet and pouring out two stiff measures, one of which he holds out to Sebastian. "It is what it appears to be and, judging from that flush of crimson on your cheek, I would say that you most certainly _do_ understand its function, Colonel. It is an _examination table_. The restraint points are for, well, _restraining_ its occupant, who may be a little squeamish when it comes to more _intimate_ examinations. Does that answer your question, Colonel?"

Sebastian feels a little faint, and whether that is due to the fact that his mind is now full of lurid images of himself bound naked to the table, helpless whilst the Professor carries out such personal examinations, or because the blood in his body all appears to have migrated south to his crotch, or a combination of the two, he cannot say.

"Well, Colonel?" Sebastian is awoken from his reverie by the Professor's voice. "Does the flush still blooming on your face indicate that you wish to sample the examination table? To be _examined_?"

oOo

Professor James Moriarty's world is remarkably well-ordered. His interests are vast; from the life cycle of the tiniest flea to the motions of the most gigantic entity in the heavens - all and any of it will arouse his lust for knowledge and his fierce intellect. Yet his _passions_ are few. He is perhaps a man whom many would call _asexual_ , although he is not. He has the same appetites as other men, even if such appetites are those of the _invert_ , but they are not and have never been in any way a burden on him, as so many fellow beings' urges are. 

His sexual experience is limited; he has enjoyed the young men who threw themselves at him in his youth. He fucked them passionately, and without remorse, especially if they afterwards declared their undying love for him. His primary satisfaction, which may be sexual or, more often not, is the control and dominance he exercises over others, and thus it is that he wishes to test Moran.

If the good Colonel will yield to the humiliation and dominance Moriarty intends to inflict upon him then he will not only be an exemplary employee, but an invaluable outlet for the Professor's occasional animal desires, and more frequent dominant and sadistic urges.

oOo

Colonel Sebastian Moran's life has, until now, been relatively straightforward. Escaping from the close confines of an unhappy family home, where he was regularly beaten and humiliated by a violent and abusive father, he joined the army and saw something of the world, earning for himself a reputation for being a cool head under fire and an excellent shot in the doing of it. His dishonourable discharge brought back all too clearly the memories of his terribly unhappy youth, and for many years he was a wild spirit, at war with the world and his fellow men, attempting to exorcise his demons with drink, and violence and sex.

He cannot recall how many men and women he fucked during those wild years, just as he cannot remember how he received all of the scars which litter his lithe, muscular body. One drunken fight in a dark alleyway blurs into another, and another. He is only thankful, now, that he is still in one piece and alive to have _any_ memories of those chaotic years.

Meeting the Professor has been for him a true epiphany. Here is a man he admires and respects, who radiates confidence and control, not in the way his father exercised control, with humiliating words and casual violence, but with a calm dignity and an innate aura of authority. Sebastian fancies the Professor's substance to be formed of granite; he likes the simile - boiling, molten, igneous rock rising up and forming the smouldering core of the man, cooling over time to hard, somewhat weathered, permanence. His authority came without seeking and is retained without effort.


	6. Gentian Violet

"Lice."

"Sir?"

"I detest lice, Colonel. Vermin. The type that hides in a person's most private parts. You surely are acquainted with _lice_ , being an ex-military man?"

"Well, yes, of course, Sir. But....."

"But _what_ , Colonel? You harbour such vermin from your army days? You are loathe to admit as much? Or, perhaps, you don't know? Could such filth be secreted upon your person? Well, Colonel?"

In the pregnant pause that follows, Sebastian knows that his answer will change his life forever. Reply in the negative, and he will no doubt continue to be a trusted employee; he will work closely with the Professor and will be relied on, valued and cherished. Yet - reply to the positive, and who knows what ecstasy he will experience, helpless before his Master, examined and touched and manhandled and humiliated, all of which cast visions before his eyes to make his cock twitch and harden and his breath quicken. 

_What shall it be, Sebastian? Safety and secure employment, or throwing all caution to the winds and in addition making yourself the Professor's plaything?_

"I don't know, Sir. You should examine me."

oOo

He is restrained on the examination table, his ankles secured to his thighs with thick leather straps, thinner strips passed behind his knees and attached to the metal loops on each side of the table. His hips are tilted upwards on a leather-covered bolster, and his wrists are cuffed together and chained to a ring at the top of the table. In short, he is laid out, thighs spread wide, his genitals and anus completely defenceless against anything the Professor may decide to inflict upon him.

Moriarty stands over him, pulling on thin black leather gloves. "I shall first examine your pubic hair for lice and other vermin. You shall remain silent during the examination, Colonel, or I shall be forced to gag you."

The Professor's gloved hands run through his hair, luxuriant and dark auburn. Sebastian cannot recall ever even _thinking_ about his crotch hair; it is simply a part of himself, and one he has kept clean and lice free since puberty. Even in the army, away serving in the sweaty climes of India or Afghanistan, he never really gave it any thought, but he is certainly thinking about it now.

"Hmmmm. You _appear_ to be vermin free, but I think as a precaution I should shave you and treat you with a vermicide. Gentian violet, Colonel. I understand it stains the skin for some considerable time."

At this, Sebastian begins to struggle in earnest. The Professor has picked up a gleaming straight razor and is sharpening it against the barber's strop in his other hand. The notion of being shaved so intimately, spread out as he is, then stained with the humiliating vermicide he recalls from his youth and his army days, is too much.

"No! No, Sir! No!"

"So it appears that you shall have to be gagged after all, Colonel." The Professor rummages in one of the drawers below the table, retrieving a gag which looks for all the world like a cricket ball on a leather strap. Hands knotted in Sebastian's hair, he drags his head back and forces the ball into his mouth. It feels to Sebastian that his jaw is surely going to be dislocated as the ball settles on his tongue, the thick band of leather buckled tightly at the back of his head.

"Now, where were we? Ah, yes. Your delousing and disinfecting. Keep still, Colonel. You most certainly do not want this blade to slip."


End file.
